My C Drive is partitioned, how do I put them together?

SexyGreyFox · 12 Mar 2019 at 21:48

Many years ago I put Win7 on a 64gb SSD, a few years later I upgraded to Win10 but I cloned to 256gb SSD and my cloning device made a 64gb C Drive and the remaining became my E drive.
Most of my software has been put on my E Drive but now I want to combine the 2 partitions into one big 256gb one.
I really don't want to re-install because to be honest and touch wood, I'm really happy how Win 10 runs.

How do I go about this please?

Armageus · 12 Mar 2019 at 21:53

SexyGreyFox said:
How do I go about this please?

You don't - Registry entries etc will all point to E:\, so even if you could merge them (or the more easily achievable: temporarily empty E: then delete E:\ and extend C: ) then some things will likely not work anyway

SexyGreyFox · 12 Mar 2019 at 21:54

I was afraid of that

Thanks for the bad news.

mattyfez · 15 Mar 2019 at 18:56

That said, its more of a psychological issue. It's nicer to have one big partition but it doesn't really make much practical difference from what you've described?

SexyGreyFox · 15 Mar 2019 at 20:46

mattyfez said:
That said, its more of a psychological issue. It's nicer to have one big partition but it doesn't really make much practical difference from what you've described?

I can't put any updates on and Dropbox won't sync.
Deleting everything I can I've just got 2gb remaining.

mattyfez · 15 Mar 2019 at 21:07

Can you lift any game save files etc. Onto an external drive/USB stick ? And then start from scratch?

Or you could clone the lot to a bigger drive but you'd still have the partition /registry issues.

You could technically unpick things but good luck with that. Sounds like more effort than it's worth.

I don't think there's really an easy answer here.

mattyfez · 15 Mar 2019 at 21:10

Lessons for the future . .

1) Don't partition drives unless you really need to.

2) if you do clone a small drive onto a larger drive, make sure you expand the partition to fill the whole drive so it's all C drive.

SexyGreyFox · 15 Mar 2019 at 21:13

I know that now but it was fine with Win 7 for years and then I upgraded.
I bought a 256gb SSD last year to start again but I can't be bothered yet.

mattyfez · 15 Mar 2019 at 21:19

It is kind of unfortunate.
Macrium reflect for example, when cloning to a larger drive won't create a partition and leave a second partition of empty space, it will just create a full c drive partition that fills the physical drive.

I'm not sure how you ended up with a 64gb c partition with a secondary E partition.

SexyGreyFox · 15 Mar 2019 at 21:53

mattyfez said:
I
I'm not sure how you ended up with a 64gb c partition with a secondary E partition.

Read my first post.
I had a 64gb SSD and used a hardware clone machine to put it on a 256gb SSD.

PiKe · 15 Mar 2019 at 22:03

The simplest way, would be to get another drive, make it drive E: and copy over the contents, then delete the E: partition on your system drive, then expand C:

bledd · 16 Mar 2019 at 08:42

Armageus said:
You don't - Registry entries etc will all point to E:\, so even if you could merge them (or the more easily achievable: temporarily empty E: then delete E:\ and extend C: ) then some things will likely not work anyway

Totally agree with this.

You could attempt it and manually fix registry and ini file pointers, but it will be massive hassle.

Quickest option is to just take a backup, then format and start again.

Backup is just in case you forget something.

Semple · 17 Mar 2019 at 15:17

Have you tweaked win10 that much that it would be difficult to replicate it as a new install?

SexyGreyFox · 17 Mar 2019 at 15:20

Semple said:
Have you tweaked win10 that much that it would be difficult to replicate it as a new install?

It's the amount of software I have and how I interact with some of the software.
It will be a real PITA to start again.
What I can do is upgrade at my own pace, I bought a 256gb SSD last year in preparation, I could keep changing my drives until I've got the new one ready.

RetiredIT · 17 Mar 2019 at 18:27

PiKe said:
The simplest way, would be to get another drive, make it drive E: and copy over the contents, then delete the E: partition on your system drive, then expand C:

This is the easiest way using your second 256 SSD:
1 - Backup all data etc on current system
2 - Install new disk and give it a high disk letter eg G:
3 - Copy all files, including hidden files, from the current E: to G: (alternatively use a cloning tool like Macrium Reflect)
4 - Restart Windows and immediately change the drive letter from E: to a different high letter such as L:
5 - Restart Windows and change the drive letter of the new disk from G: to E:
6 - Test that all software is working correctly.
7 - When satisfied with the testing results delete the second partition on the original disk and grow the C

artition to use the full disk.

SexyGreyFox · 17 Mar 2019 at 21:59

RetiredIT said:
This is the easiest way using your second 256 SSD:
1 - Backup all data etc on current system
2 - Install new disk and give it a high disk letter eg G:
3 - Copy all files, including hidden files, from the current E: to G: (alternatively use a cloning tool like Macrium Reflect)
4 - Restart Windows and immediately change the drive letter from E: to a different high letter such as L:
5 - Restart Windows and change the drive letter of the new disk from G: to E:
6 - Test that all software is working correctly.
7 - When satisfied with the testing results delete the second partition on the original disk and grow the Cartition to use the full disk.

Great suggestion but I presume that means I have 2x SSD's in my system.
I already have 3x 3gb HD's

RetiredIT · 17 Mar 2019 at 22:53

SexyGreyFox said:
Great suggestion but I presume that means I have 2x SSD's in my system.
I already have 3x 3gb HD's

I was referring to your earlier comment that you had purchased an additional 256 GB drive. Based on the information above you could use any new disk, or an existing disk provided there were no problems in changing the drive letter of this disk to E:. If you use an existing disk then cloning will not be an option.

The key thing is that the current contents of E: are moved to another disk with the letter E: so that all the references continue to work.

Disco_P · 18 Mar 2019 at 00:11

If you have any space on E:, you could shrink it and expand C: using something like EaseUS Partition Master.

hyperseven · 18 Mar 2019 at 00:35

copy all E data to a folder on C and SUBST it as a virtual drive assigned back to E so all on the same partition and your apps should still work.

clone this partition to the new SSD

Randomface74 · 18 Mar 2019 at 00:40

make sure pagefile and hibernation file aren't on C.